


Their Unmaking

by pherryt



Series: Till the End of the Line [4]
Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Betrayals, Brainwashing, Capture, Escape Attempts, How it all started, Hurt/Comfort, Lots of Angst, M/M, Not A Happy Ending, PoW, Prisoners, Revelations, Smut, Torture, Trapped, Violence, War, a softness in the dark, brief non explicit suicidal thought
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-21
Updated: 2020-07-17
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:54:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22345939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pherryt/pseuds/pherryt
Summary: To say that Clint and Bucky didn't meet under the best of circumstances would be an understatement - but they did, and they're all the other has to hold on to in this bleak existence of theirs.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Clint Barton, Winterhawk
Series: Till the End of the Line [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1569418
Comments: 26
Kudos: 62
Collections: Bucky Barnes Bingo 2020, Mandatory Fun Day





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> finally, an entry for the winterhawk mandatory fun day prompt - winter soldier clint  
> broken angels was suppose to be it but it featured ameriwinterwidowhawk so didn't qualify
> 
> this is a prequel to that, so there we go! 
> 
> note - when i started broken angels, no one shots were planned at all. now they won't stop coming. after each one, i think, there won't be another one and then there is. i don't have any more planned, but as there are other facets of the dynamics in broken angels that could be explored, i won't be surprised if something comes to me... again.

Clint Barton had been too young during the train accident that had taken his parents lives for him to realize there was something odd going on. The fact that he’d survived when others didn’t hadn’t even crossed his mind, because Barney had too.

People called it a miracle. They even got in the local newspaper, the whole time Clint wondering why. All sorts of people made a whole lot of fuss over it, for no reason he could see.

And then whatever their fame had been, it wore off as quickly as it had come, the two children suddenly dropped at the closest orphanage and promptly forgotten.

It hadn’t been too bad at the orphanage. It was strict, and times were lean, but no one beat them and Clint was all for that. But the other children thought them strange and then the day came when they found out they’d be split up.

So they ran away to the circus and honestly, times were just as lean, and just as strict, but Clint and Barney got to stick together and Clint found something he could  _ do _ and do  _ well. _

He learned archery first, then tumbling and highwires, Barney right beside him. They both got good, but Clint was better, and soon they’d both been incorporated into various acts.

Eventually, Clint even got his own.

They might have stayed there indefinitely, if it hadn’t been for the misstep that should have carried Clint to his death. The whole tent went quiet when he fell, then cheered when he stood up and brushed himself off, limping away with a cheerful wave – always the performer, just as he’d been taught.

Once away from the ring and the lights, though, things changed. The people they entertained would have no idea that Clint had just miraculously survived a fall that he shouldn’t have – they would have thought it was part of the act, that something had been set up ahead of time that allowed him to walk away from a death defying feat.

The others, though, they knew. They knew it hadn’t been planned, that it was an accident, that nothing was in place to save him –

And that he’d walked away with barely a scratch.

They whispered behind their hands. They eyed Clint suspiciously, this bunch of people who’d become like family, who’d accepted the outcasts and misfits of all sorts – but for some reason, this was just one step too far for them to accept.

Even Barney looked at him weirdly, before telling Clint quietly about the train accident – an event that had left nightmares but no real memories in his mind. About how both of them survived what all the adults around them had agreed was impossible to survive.

“I didn’t think much of it then,” Barney admitted. “I remember how adults, how  _ dad _ always thought he knew everything, and he was often wrong. So I just thought… they were wrong.” Barney shrugged.

“But they weren’t, were they?” Clint whispered. “I’m a freak.”

Barney clasped his shoulder. “We both are. I survived that train wreck too, little brother.”

They stuck it out, as long as they could, but they were watched every instant. Some seemed fearful, some seemed awed and a few others…

It made Clint’s skin crawl, the way certain folks looked at him, and sometimes Barney, calculation in their eyes, a cruel glee.

‘Accidents’ started happening in practice more and more, injuring both Clint and Barney, never badly enough to take them out of the show, but enough that the whispers never truly died down.

“I can’t stay here,” Barney growled one night, after practice had left him with several long gashes on his arms and face. Their teacher never missed a shot, a point the Swordsman had boasted with great pride on many, many occasions.

This didn’t look good. It didn’t look good at all.

“I’m leaving, and you should come with me.”

Clint stared as Barney moved around their shared living space, packing a bag with essentials. Clint chewed his lip.

“Barn, even if you’re right, where’re we gonna go? We don’t know nothin’ else,” Clint pointed out. He knew Barney was right, that the injuries Barney had sustained were deliberate and definitely a sign of worse to come. They  _ couldn’t _ stay, but he was scared.

“We’re marksman, Clint. And we’re damn good at it. We can enlist. Bet the war could use guys like us,” Barney said.

“You mean, people shooting at us? Trying to kill us?” Clint asked dubiously. “How’s that any better than here?”

“Because  _ they  _ won’t know our secret, and a battlefield’s gotta be chaos. Maybe they  _ think  _ you got shot, but ta-da! You didn’t!”

“It won’t be that easy,” Clint said, “It can’t!” But he was already moving, already packing his own bag. He faltered when it came to the bow.

“You can’t take it with you,” Barney snapped. “Don’t even try. They’ll just make you get rid of it.”

“I don’t know  _ guns,  _ Barn. I know this,” Clint protested. “Army’s never gonna believe I can hit shit when I’ve never touched a gun in my life.”

Barney threw his hands up in the air. “Fine, do whatever.” He hoisted his bag over his shoulder. “C’mon, you finished packing yet?”

“Yeah, almost.” Clint looked around. He’d lived here a good long time but for all that, there wasn’t much he could take with him. The outfit he wore in the show would be useless, and the army was sure to not let him keep too much.

There were some pictures, though.  _ Those  _ he wanted, even if Barney didn’t. He stuffed them carefully into his bag and slung it over his shoulder, grabbed the bow and quiver and nodded at his brother.

They slipped out in the dead of night, closer to the morning side of things, knowing that  _ most  _ of the circus folk would sleep in a little later after a show, and they started walking.

It took them days to get to the nearest recruitment base from the circuses’ last location, and they had to go slowly, hiding from any possible searchers, stealing food as they went. It hadn’t been till that moment that Clint had realized the lack of his money. The circus had provided everything they could have wanted, within reason.

The army took them in, in no shortage of need for bodies, and looked just as askance at Clint’s bow as Barney had predicted.

Once he’d shown them what he could do, however, their eyes lit up and plans were made. Barney grimaced, but they were put together. It was… it was hard. Clint didn’t like killing people at all, but he had a weapon that was silent, and nobody was looking at him or Barney like they were freaks. They had a job to do, a job so wholly different than their previous life, but it was one in which they could save lives.

* * *

Of course, everything fell to shit, during a raid in some town Clint couldn’t even remember the name of. Or pronounce, for that matter. Bombs had been going off pretty much  _ everywhere _ and he and Barney and the rest of their unit had gotten separated from each other so fast it made Clint’s head spin and his heart pound in panic.

And that’s when yet another bomb landed, this time far too close for Clint to get away. It went off and he was deafened and blinded nearly instantly, the pain hitting next before everything went blissfully black.

It didn’t last.

When Clint woke, he was in agony, gasping, trying to move – he had to, he had to move, he couldn’t let the enemy find him – but succeeded only in blacking out again, just as he caught sight of Nazi uniforms.

_ Great idea, Barn… _

Clint was in and out of consciousness for an unknown amount of time, delirious and in the most pain he could remember ever being in in his life. His vision swam before his eyes, his ears were silent. He choked, pushing to sit up, but found he was being held down by… by something.

Struggling, Clint pushed at the bindings. A grinning face appeared, blurring in and out of focus. And then the world went black again.

The next time he woke, his ears were ringing strangely, the sound around him oddly distorted and distant. His eyes still blurred, though not as bad as they had been, the pain was diminished but still strongly present.

Around him, someone barked orders in a language he didn’t understand but recognized all too well.

“Well, well, you are awake,” the face said in heavily accented English.

“He’s just like the other one,” another voice said. It was far too excited for Clint’s peace of mind.

_ Wait… _

_Other one what? Who? Another one… Like him?_ Clint struggled to remember, but his memory was full of holes… but _, yes,_ there’d been a bomb, a bomb that probably should have killed Clint, as close as he’d been, if he’d been normal… but he wasn’t, and neither was Barney –

Barney…

_ No, no, no, not Barney! _ Clint thought in a panic. He struggled, tried to shout, but he was easily held down, stuck with a needle and then jerked to his feet.

Still reeling and far from healed, Clint was thrown into a cell roughly. As soon as he could get to his feet – which was a few hours more, maybe, he wasn’t too sure - he was at the door, looking for any way to pick the lock. He’d learned a lot of things at the circus, even things he’d not been too keen on, but he was damn grateful for it now.

Clint grinned when his bleeding fingers managed to open the lock and he slipped out, limping as quietly as he could down the hallway.

He didn’t get very far before he was recaptured.

This time, he was dragged into another room, a room with a weird metal chair. And Barney. Sitting in it. The elation of finding Barney was quickly overshadowed when he saw that Barney was strapped down, when he saw the guards placed around the room.

He surged forward, yelling Barney’s name. Barney twitched, head lolling up to look at Clint, fear and pain and guilt in his eyes.

Clint was snagged and forced down to his knees before he’d taken even a single step towards his brother.

“Now, now, that won’t do,” a man said with a grin. “Why fight the inevitable? You and your brother will be joining our cause, whether you want to or not. We have ways to keep you under our control. A pair of unkillable warriors… would truly be an asset for HYDRA. But unkillable doesn’t mean we can’t make you suffer. So if you don’t cooperate…”

The man pointed to another, standing by a wall of buttons, switches and dials and the other nodded, hands moving quickly, fingers twisting and pressing and Clint frowned because, was that supposed to be impressive?

Then Barney screamed and Clint’s blood froze.

* * *

There didn’t seem to be any end to the torture and Clint never got any time alone with Barney. Not for the first time, he wished they’d never left the circus. Would it truly have been any worse to stay there?

The torture they were enduring here was terrible, in every way imaginable, but Clint eventually came to the painful conclusion that yes, it would have.

Because the very same people he’d once thought of as family had turned on them. Had betrayed their trust, their love. The pain of that hurt on a spiritual level, but was no less real for all that.

Didn’t keep him from screaming when their captors cut into him while he was awake, while they sent electrical currents through his brain. Didn’t stop him from attempting to escape, from trying to find Barney and rescuing him. Clint never knew if Barney ever tried and failed just as he had, or if he hadn’t even bothered at all – no, Clint wouldn’t think like that. Barney was his brother. His only family, the only person who stuck by him through everything.

Barney wouldn’t just roll over, wouldn’t give up on trying to escape, on bringing Clint with him. they’d run away to the circus together and they’d left it together. They’d get out of here together too, and so Clint didn’t stop trying. The punishments when he failed were truly awful, but if they could get away, the punishments and the torture would  _ end. _

He almost came close a few times, but there was only so far you could go when your brother had been incapacitated in some way, so badly, as to make rescue impossible. One, all too memorable time, Clint had found Barney reduced to a quivering heap of burned flesh, blinded and deafened.

Clint felt sick the second he laid eyes on Barney. Could barely hold back when Barney – maddened with pain and unable to tell who was there – weakly fought back, pushing Clint away while screaming.

Clint fell to his knees in horror, in despair and heaved till there was nothing left, then cried his eyes out, curled into a ball.

The guards found him there, of course and Zola grinned down at him with that same, wide, creepy smile.

“For every resistance you or your brother give us, this is what shall be done to the other. You belong to  _ us  _ now. But don’t you worry. We’re working on a way that will make this easier on both of you. Everything will be all right soon…”

Zola petted Clint on the head like an animal.

Clint heaved one last time, making sure to get Zola’s shoes.

* * *

Time passed weirdly in this place. Clint was never taken to anyplace with a window, and each wait between sessions with the doctors and scientists seemed interminable. Also, he had never in his life been hurt this bad. The pain was distracting in every kind of way when he was awake, and who knew how long he was unconscious whenever it had become too much, whenever they did to him what they’d done to his brother.

His best guess was months…

Months of being used like a lab rat, treated worse than any of the circus animals had ever been. Clint had never been more envious of one of the lions or elephants from the show before. Time, and time again, Clint was put in the same damn metal chair Barney had been in that first day, the pain it inflicted was tremendous, though it left them bodily intact. His mind, though, once they were done Clint found himself in an odd haze for undetermined amounts of time. He couldn’t focus, couldn’t think, only blindly, vaguely obey…

It eventually wore off, and he thought it was just another torture device with a weird side effect – or maybe that was just what happened when you were tortured like this? But it was becoming increasingly clear through their continuing frustration that it was meant to do something more… he just… didn’t understand  _ what. _

“Why won’t the conditioning take? The Barton's are  _ useless _ to me, to our cause, without a way to control them reliably for more than a few days at a time. Fix it!” Zola snapped.

“Sir, we think it's not the programming’s fault. It's their accelerated healing. It fixes the body, given enough time, what if it…” the other white coated man trailed off and Zola groaned.

“You are saying,” Zola intoned slowly, his voice going deceptively soft - It made the hair on the back of Clint’s neck stand up – “That their healing factor is undoing everything we do to their minds?”

“Yes, sir,” the other man said.

Zola turned thoughtful, the sort of look that usually preceded more and more pain and Clint watched him fearfully. What new terror would Zola unleash on him?

“You just might be right,” Zola conceded. “Test it.”

“Sir!?”

“It’s still a theory until we test it. So,  _ test  _ the chair on another subject.”

The other man’s eyes widened. “It’s pointless, Dr. Zola. There are no other subjects this chair won’t  _ kill! _ We’ve never had a successful test before this! Without the buffer of the healing factor, the stresses on the body is too much!”

“Maybe not,” Zola murmured. “I believe my newest acquisition is just about thawed…” Zola smiled and Clint shivered. Zola turned, waving his hand about in the air. “Get him out of the chair, and remind him of what we’ll do to his brother if he doesn’t cooperate with us. Let’s go see an old… friend.”

Clint swallowed, rubbing at his wrists as he was released.

He somehow didn’t think whoever they were about to go see was going to be any more pleased to see Zola than Clint was.

* * *

Bucky woke groggily, cold and aching. His vision swam and he gritted his teeth to hold back the scream when tried to sit up. Chills wracked his body but he was overheating. The last thing he remembered was falling.

Falling, falling, snow and mountains, the train, Zola, Steve –

_ Where was Steve? _

“Steve? Did we get him? Did we get Zola?”

A blonde, tall and battered in a way that almost felt familiar, stepped into Bucky’s wavering view, staring down at him.

“Steve!” Bucky gasped out in relief, reaching for him. The battered blonde frowned and shook his head.

“Sorry, not Steve.” The voice was hoarse, rough, but sympathetic.

Around them, orders were being shouted, Bucky was being jostled... Pain exploded through him and he screamed, unable to hold it back this time. He fell back, panting and he looked around the room frantically. It was shockingly white, so white it was hurting his eyes. There were strangers moving around him and, and someone was advancing on him with wicked looking blades.

They were doctors, he’d been hurt… Bucky tried to assure himself, all while watching them uneasily. He’d been hurt, hurt pretty bad if the pain running through him was any indication. He’d been hurt – how had he gotten hurt?

Oh God.

Steve.

Bucky had fallen.

He’d fallen…

And these doctors weren’t allied forces. Their insignia… oh god, oh god, oh god…

He’d been captured…

Again.

And Steve hadn't come for him this time. Where was Steve? Had he been captured too? After everything, this was exactly what Bucky had feared! Steve in danger, captured, dying – when he coulda been home in Brooklyn, safe as houses…

“Steve!” his throat hurt so badly that the shout was more a rasp. He surged up, trying to push the doctors off of him, but the blonde –  _ Not Steve _ \- pushed him back down to the table with a hissed, “Don’t fight it – it only makes it worse!”

_ What? _ Bucky stared. Not Steve – who was looking younger than either Bucky or Steve despite the dried blood and all the cuts and bruises he was sporting - was still frowning, the space between his brows furrowed in... In... Bucky had no idea, unable to think too clearly, but the man wasn't as rough as he’d expected for being once more in enemy hands.

He glanced away fearfully and quickly backed away from Bucky as a man in a labcoat crossed between them.

“The ice preserved him nicely,” the man murmured. “And for so long, too. We should look into that. The possibilities…”

“Agreed. Doctor, the serum you developed worked like a charm. It may not have been up to Erskine’s standards, but it’s obvious you succeeded in some way. Too bad about the arm,” came another voice. “You! Hold him down.”

The blond jerked into motion, tripping over himself in his haste to get back to Bucky, his head ducking as if expecting a blow.

_ What? What were they talking about? What was going on _ ? Bucky struggled again but the blonde man held him down with seemingly no effort.  _ Why did he feel so weak? _

The fall.

How badly was he hurt?

And then Zola swam into view, pushing aside the other man and Bucky's blood ran cold. They  _ had  _ failed! Had Steve fallen too? Oh god, please let him have gotten away…

“Steve,” he choked, eyes filling with tears.

“We'll make him a better one.” Zola grinned.

“No! Get away from me!” Bucky could barely get the words out.

“Give it up, Sergeant Barnes. The war is long over and Captain America is gone. No one is going to save you now.” Zola continued to grin at him and it sent cold chills down Bucky's spine. “They all think you dead…”

Steve couldn’t be gone. 

_ No, no, no! _

Bucky refused to believe it.

“-No, no, no, no –“

“Proceed.”

Then they started to cut into him and he screamed…

The last thing he saw was the blonde who wasn’t Steve look away, blanching, and then Bucky thankfully, finally, blacked out once more.

* * *

Time moved oddly from then on, Bucky floating in and out of consciousness as pain raised him out of blissful unawareness, but never for long. The cutting continued, as did other tortures of the body and the mind. Questions were asked but they were secondary to whatever it was they were doing to him, and he was out of it enough that eventually his interrogators gave up.

The next time he woke, he was alone, in a cell, something about it vaguely familiar. Every muscle in his body ached but it was his arm that grabbed his attention. It was a lead weight at his side, one that pulled painfully at his shoulder. It didn’t want to move and he found standing from the floor difficult with only one arm for leverage.

Shoving along the walls, Bucky investigated the interior of his cell as best as he could in the dim light. There were no windows to the outside, he discovered, leaving just light from the opening on the cell door as the only illumination. It was dead quiet, too, just the drip of water and – no there was a rustle and Bucky edged closer to the door, trying to see what shared the cell with him.

That’s when he realized it wasn’t coming from his cell, but from the other side of the wall. Likely another cell, another cage, another prisoner.

“Who’s there?” Bucky asked. Maybe it was stupid, but the quiet was already getting to him. The not knowing where he was… his most recent memory seemed a little spotty. There’d been a mission, hadn’t there?

There was a scrabbling on the other side, and then a voice. “Clint,” the man said. “I'm Clint. They took me during the war. Me and my brother. You?”

Bucky swallowed. “James,” he said. He wasn't Bucky here, wasn’t going to give this guy that name. This could be a trap. But for what? He was already a prisoner. And he  _ had  _ asked first. “I can’t remember. I fell. I need to find Steve.”

The scraping sounds grew louder, purposeful, followed by a knocking sound. Bucky edged closer, following it till it settled in one corner of the cell. He slid down the wall and sat beside it, pretending he was sitting beside the stranger, that they shared a connection by being on the other side of the same wall.

Suddenly, a stone in the wall, along the floor, disappeared, and a hand, with bloodied fingertips, reached through.

“I know you're scared, buddy,” Clint whispered. “Me too.”

Almost as soon as he saw Clint’s hand, that offered bit of comfort, Bucky was swallowed in a desperate need for human contact that wasn't pain and torture. Bucky shifted, curling against the wall and grabbing the grubby, bloody hand with his own. He sobbed as the hand gave his a gentle squeeze.

Bucky didn’t know who was _ really _ in the other cell, friend or foe, but talking to him was the only thing grounding him right now. He had to get out of here. Had to find Stevie. 

* * *

Clint turned out to be the blonde he’d first thought was Steve. The one who’d held him down.

Bucky didn’t talk to him for days after that betrayal. At least, he thought it was days. He counted the meals, the rounds of the guards. Clint let him be after his first few attempts at talking through the hole in the wall had failed to draw Bucky out, but eventually, the silence preyed on him and Bucky crawled back to it, to him. He still didn’t say anything, couldn’t make himself speak, but Clint seemed to know he was there and he began to talk.

“I keep trying to escape, you know. But I can never get too far. Reached my brother once but… he was in no condition to leave and I couldn’t leave without him. They punish us, of course. After each attempt. Try to use each of us as incentive against the other. But it won’t work. I’ll never give up trying to get out of here.”

Bucky felt the tears prick his eyes at the desperate hope in Clint’s voice. He couldn’t talk, not yet, he wasn’t ready…

But he reached through the hole, meeting Clint’s hand on the other side and giving it a squeeze.

Clint’s breathing hitched, his words faltered before they picked back up, but he squeezed back, nice and tight.

In the comfort of Clint’s touch, Bucky slept.

When he woke, Clint was gone. No hand, no voice.

“Clint?” he whispered. There was no answer. Bucky was left in his cell through several poor meals before he heard something being dragged down the hall, a cell door – not his – opening, and something thudding to the ground. There was cruel laughter as the door slammed shut again, the lock creaking into place, almost hiding the low groan.

“Clint?” Bucky called, worry choking his voice. He laid down on the ground, tried to peer through the whole but it was dark as sin. Was Clint hurt? Had they tortured him? for  _ days? _ Jesus.

A groan answered him, then the sound of something slowly shifting. Bucky’s heart pounded. Clint was dragging himself along the floor. He was hurt so bad he didn’t want to stand, didn’t even want to crawl. What were they doing to him? Why did Zola even  _ want  _ them? Zola had to know, even if he succeeded in his experiments, he’d never get Bucky to do what they wanted , right? Or was he just that insane? Like the mad scientists of those pulp novels he read?

“What’d they do?” Bucky asked. The dragging sound came to a stop, and he listened to Clint’s ragged breathing in horror.

“Same… as usual,” Clint slurred. There was rustle and Clint’s trembling hand pushed itself through the hole and Bucky grasped it like a lifeline. His fingers were wet… bloody?

“We gotta get outta here,” Bucky said. “You said you’ve tried before. You can get out of the cell?”

“Yeah, but, I can’t fight and haul Barney at the same time.”

“I’ll watch your back, we can all get outta here,” Bucky said.

There was an indrawn breath and Clint breathed out, “God, yeah, yeah, three of us? We can do it. Just… let me heal up first, okay?”

“How long?” Bucky’s heart sank at the thought of being stuck here any loner than he wanted to be, but what else could they do?

“Couple days, maybe? Not long,” Clint choked on a wet laugh. “The whole reason they still keep me ‘round’s cause they can’t kill me. Or Barn. Cause we’re freaks. They think they can find a way to control us.”

“Huh… that’s… a little odd, I’ll admit but, hey, my best friend is Captain America, and the Red Skull can rip his face off, literally. So I’m, uh, kinda getting used to odd,” Bucky said.

“Oh god,” Clint said, his fingers spasming around Bucky’s and a shaky little laugh escaping him. The laugh turned into a sob and Clint didn’t speak again for a long time.

* * *

Clint still couldn’t believe it. if he hadn’t seen James himself, he’d have thought the other man was a plant, another attempt to make him toe the line. And now, here he was, offering to help him and Barney escape – none of the other prisoners had been brave enough to try, or capable of trusting him long enough – and one by one, they died, as the experiments on them failed.

And he didn’t care, that him and Barney were freaks. He didn’t care and… Clint was sure he meant it too.

This was gonna work, this time, it had to.

The days waiting to heal were an agonizing trial, but eventually, Clint deemed himself good enough. He spoke his plans to James, simple as they were, ran them through the layout of the base they were in, wherever that was, and hoped to God they weren’t in the middle of Bumfuck, Nowhere.

“If I’m hurt, don’t worry about me. I can keep going. I can heal. Get Barney out and if I have to, I’ll try again later.”

“What? That’s crazy,” James said.

Clint shook his head even though James couldn’t see it. “I’ve already proven I can get out anytime I want… there’s no way they can keep me here if he’s gone. And, and you too.” Clint said that last softly. He hadn’t know James long, but he’d been the only truly human contact he’d had in so long. “I just need everyone safe, first. Promise me.”

There was a hesitation on the other side of the wall. “It won’t come to that,” James said in that husky voice of his. God, but Clint had come to love the very sound of that voice when James had finally stopped screaming.

Waiting patiently for the current round of guards to pass, then a little longer to let them get out of earshot, Clint put his circus training into use, bouncing off the corner walls till he could flip up, grabbing the well worn handhold he’d created. The ceiling was high enough, the cells dark enough, that nobody had either noticed or cared that there was a gap. If they had, likely they figured it was too high to reach and too skinny for anyone to get through.

Smiling smugly, Clint squeezed into the tiny gap, scraping his chest painfully through his shirt. His head was the hardest fit, but he turned it sideways and slowly pushed himself through till he tumbled out the other side, rolling to his feet noiselessly.

Peering around, even though he knew the guards were gone, Clint checked the hall before stepping to James’s door. He lifted the bolt and slid it back, pushing the door open with a creek. Light spilled in, illuminating James. He was dirty, unshaven, his clothes the torn rags of a uniform and one armed and he was the most beautiful thing Clint had ever seen. James stared at him for a second before Clint jerked his head and stepped away from the cell.

James scrambled after him before regaining control over himself, proving he was just as capable of moving sneakily as Clint was as they moved through the hall. Barney was never kept down here, but Clint checked the rooms anyway.

It wouldn’t do to get to the other side and find out they’d missed Barney along the way.

They found Barney in the lab, just stepping down from the damn metal chair, his eyes slightly vacant. The scientists around him were chattering, the guards were lax as Clint peered inside. He motioned to James to look, then leaned in close behind him to whisper in his ear.

“That’s my brother, the shirtless one. You take right, I’ll take left. He’s surprisingly mobile. Last time he wasn’t so much,” Clint said. James nodded and they separated, set up outside the door, took a deep breath and opened it, charging through not an instant later.

They’d picked up weapons on their way in and Clint didn’t hesitate to shoot a single goddamn soul. They were all responsible for the evils of this place. Why should he stop himself? They’d tortured him and Barney and James too, and who knew how many other people. They deserved more bad for what they did.

Clint went after a guard first, disarming him and stealing the man’s weapon before turning it on everyone else. James had done the same – albeit at a slower pace and was proving to be an excellent shot himself as scientist and guard alike went down before his onslaught.

They might actually do this. “Jesus, finally. Barney,” Clint said when the last guy went down and Barney stood through it all, strangely still. Clint wrapped his arms around his brother with a joyful lurch in his stomach before pulling back. “C’mon, let’s get outta here.”

Clint didn’t get far when Barney smiled at him in a way that made his heart stop. He’d never seen that expression on his brother’s face, ever. That smile was, was  _ twisted _ and  _ wrong  _ and Clint froze.

Then Barney’s hand came up and slugged him in the stomach, hard. Unprepared for it, unprepared for violence from his _brother,_ of all people, who’d been with him through thick and thin, Clint staggered back and dropped, gasping. He looked up at Barney, confused. “What?”

Barney charged him and Clint could only stare at him blankly in disbelief, till James stepped in the way, taking the blow and turning it back on Barney.

Clint shook his head as he watched the two of them fight. Barney was a shooter, not a fighter, while James clearly knew what he was doing – but only had one arm to work with. And every blow between the two of them was a blow to Clint’s heart.

Why had Barney turned on them?

“Barney! Stop! We can finally get out of here,” Clint said, hiccoughing, tears obscuring his vision. Wait, he didn’t know James, what if Barney thought this was a trap? “James is  _ helping  _ us get out of here.”

James was thrown back, across the room and into a wall and Barney stalked towards him, a knife suddenly in his hand. Clint leapt up and launched himself at Barney’s back, wrapping his arms around his neck and yanking.

“Stop it!” he yelled. “Please, Barney, just stop!”

“That is enough!” Zola’s voice cut through the room sharply and Barney stopped moving. Clint was peeled off Barney’s back with force, shoved and pushed to his knees. Armed guards flowed past them, a couple yanking James to his feet and forcing him to kneel beside Clint.

Blood trickled down the side of his face and he was breathing hard. Tears still streamed from Clint’s eyes.

“I’m sorry, James,” he whispered. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know what happened.”

“What happened, Clinton,” Zola said, strolling over stand before them, his hand behind his back. “Is that your brother finally picked a side. The right one. You’re too late. You will never escape us. And since you have taken a liking to our newest guest – “

Zola’s fingers flickered and James was yanked back to his feet, pushed towards the metal chair that had given Clint so much pain, shoved into it and strapped down. He struggled the entire time, but it was to no avail. James was soon bound to the chair, the helmet dropped over his head and the guards backing away.

“This is your reward for trying to escape,” Zola said, nodding to the scientist who’d followed him into the room. The man stepped over the bodies he and James had dropped, and started flicking switches and twisting dials and James screamed.

Clint couldn’t look away at the anguish and pain etched into every muscle of James’s body. He knew they could have done nothing other than try to escape, knew that they would be tortured no matter what they did, but he couldn’t help but blame himself for this.

For the pain being inflicted on James.

Managing to tear his eyes away for just a second, Clint locked eyes with Barney. “Why?”

Barney had the good sense to look away in shame. “It’s for the best, little brother.”

“I don’t believe that. I’ll  _ never  _ believe that,” Clint whispered brokenly.

“Then you will suffer needlessly, and so will he,” Zola said. “Just give up, Clinton. Be a good Barton, like your brother.” Clint pulled his head away when Zola’s hands dropped on his head but Zola grabbed a fistful of his hair, grown all too long in his captivity, and yanked.

He jerked Clint’s face back around to watch James scream and writhe and the tears didn’t stop.

And when James was left once more in the cell beside Clint’s, bleeding and out of it, Clint waited. He waited for the guards to leave, then repeated his performance from earlier – but instead of leaving, he shimmied over the wall between the cells and dropped to his feet silently, crawling over to where James shook on the cold, hard ground. He pulled James into his lap and cradled him.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” Clint repeated, over and over again, petting his hand along James’s matted hair. “Fuck, I am so  _ fucking  _ sorry.”

“S’not your fault,” James mumbled into Clint’s leg. He shuddered again, the after affects of that damn chair. Clint wondered if James was a freak too, that he survived the chair when Zola had said that most didn’t. Was this punishment for being different? Had all those people in the circus been right?

Did they  _ deserve  _ this somehow?

Clint clutched at James, propping himself up in the corner and making themselves as comfortable as possible. This couldn’t last, whatever this was. Were they friends, or simply two lost souls working towards a common goal? Whatever it was, Clint didn’t want to let it go.

He’d already lost everything else in his life, and now Barney.

Barney had betrayed him. The one person he should have been able to count on, and Clint had been betrayed by him.

“Someday, James, we’ll get out of here,” Clint whispered, like a mantra. “I won’t give up, so you don’t either, okay? Then the pain will end.”

“Steve’ll save us,” James said sluggishly, but with such deep belief it cut Clint to the core – or it would if Barney hadn’t already scooped it right out.

“Who’s Steve?” Clint asked, feeling a pang of jealousy that James still had someone he could still wholeheartedly believe in.

“He’s Captain fucking America. And he’s a goddamned punk who don’t know when to quit. He’ll come after us, I know it.”

“He’ll come after you,” Clint pointed out, afraid to rely on any sort of outside hope, but desperately wanting to. He was tired of fighting.

“When Stevie rescued me the first time, he liberated the whole goddamned base to boot. Kid ain’t never done things by halves,” James whispered, the words coming slower and more sluggish. Clint continued petting his head long after James fell asleep.

* * *

That became a thing.

When it was safe, when he was able, Clint climbed down into Bucky’s cell with him. he wasn’t sure how the hell he was doing it, but it had to be the same way he’d gotten out in the first place.

They made plans. Bucky was certain Stevie would come for him, and therefore them, but he wasn’t going to give in without a fight like a damsel in distress. If they had a chance, they should damn well take it.

Clint agreed, relief in every line of his body that Bucky could feel against his. They cuddled together for comfort, for warmth, for the touch of someone that didn’t bring pain.

It helped, reminding each other of the good things, even as it made things worse, each new wave of pain and torture a sharp contrast. But Bucky healed. Slowly, slower than Clint, but faster than he’d ever had before.

It was something he’d noticed shortly after Steve’s first rescue. He’d needed less sleep, more food, was a little stronger and durable and that papercut he got when he first got back had been gone in less than a day.

Clint had called himself a freak, but maybe Bucky was one too.

Before they could make their next attempt, Clint was taken away and Bucky was left agonizing on his whereabouts for days, if his sense of time was right, as it adjusted to the ever present darkness of the cell.

When he came back, he was shoved into his cell and Bucky had to hold himself silent far too long, waiting for the guards to leave again. As soon as they were gone, he was by the hole, leaning down to be heard.

“Clint? Are you okay?” If he was injured badly enough, there’d be no way for him to get into Bucky’s cell. Bucky had tried the reverse when Clint finally showed him what he was doing, but Bucky had been too bulky. He might still have been able to force himself through, he wasn’t  _ that  _ much bulkier than Clint, but the lack of an arm made it impossible for him to even try without Clint’s help.

Which mean their only way out relied on Clint or Steve. And the chances were looking slimmer every day.

Where was Steve?

The moments stretched and Clint didn’t answer. “Clint?” How badly was he hurt? Was he unconscious? Fuck, but Bucky really wished he could be on that side now, to help him.

Clint groaned, and then something flared, a small light appearing, flickering – where and why had Clint gotten his hands on a candle? The short, stubby candle appeared in the hole, Clint slowly pushing it through. “Take it,” he whispered.

There was another sound, a rustling that was all too foreign in these cells. The sound of… paper? What the fuck was going on?

A newspaper was pushed through the hole next and Bucky stared at it like it was a bomb. It might as well have been. The paper was almost two years old now, and the headline read “Captain America – Missing”. The subsequent story talked about the disappearance of Captain America over the arctic within days of the war ending and how the search was still going on but he was presumed dead.

“This your Steve?” Clint asked softly

Bucky shook and cried, clutching that paper to his chest then scouring through the words as if it might change anything.

It didn't.

Stevie wouldn’t be coming for them…

They were on their own.


	2. Giving up Hope

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> RATING CHANGE!   
> ALso, I didn't plan to make a second chapter for this. i knew i might do other one shots (like one for nat and clint) but i didn't expect to expand this. but of course i did. 
> 
> things definitely get a little darker here, but then, it's going to get darker before it can get better in Broken Angels. so keep that in mind
> 
> plus, as you can see in this chapter, Bucky and Clint are finding ways to be happy , even if it's in small doses.
> 
> Gonna mark this for the bucky barnes bingo square: k3 - hurt/comfort

Despite the newspaper, despite the proof, Bucky clung to thoughts of Steve for a good, long time, Clint there to take the brunt of Bucky’s grief. Years must have passed and the chance of escape _or_ rescue grew all that much slimmer, Zola taking steps to ensure each attempt would fail or that they were in no condition to make one, using them against each other.

Every day was torture.

Every day Bucky lost a little bit more hope for Steve, for himself or Clint.

When Clint’s brother had turned him, Bucky had been there for him, best as he could. They became each other’s lifelines, their sole light at the end of their tunnels.

Zola and Hydra did things to Bucky, and to Clint. Horrific, unspeakable things, and yet…

And yet Bucky lived.

There were times he wished otherwise, times he wanted to be Clint to just help him end it –

But he couldn’t do it, couldn’t go through with it. Even if he could be killed – and Hydra was pushing him just a little bit further, every day, to see if he _could_ be without actually doing it if they’d misjudged – Clint couldn’t. Clint would be trapped here, forever and alone.

Bucky couldn’t do that to him. He didn’t deserve that. Nobody deserved that. Bucky held on to the bright dream of Steve’s rescue as a way to stay strong, stay resolute – for Clint’s sake – despite the growing certainty, deep in his gut, that it was a lost cause.

How he wished that the papers had been wrong… but maybe the serum hadn’t been a miracle drug after all.

Maybe Bucky shouldn’t have gotten out of Azzano alive to begin with, because ever since then Bucky had already been living on borrowed time and the reaper had come to take his due, to make him suffer for it.

Hopelessness would wind through him, shaking Bucky down to his core, until he became an unmoving lump between visits from the guards or to the scientists. Morbid thoughts would take over his mind until he was gasping from it, and then it was Clint’s turn to comfort Bucky with tuneless crooning and farfetched stories, with stroking hands and warm embraces.

It was perhaps inevitable that something more would come from that, and yet when Bucky felt the stirring of something more than comfort in Clint’s arms, it made him want to do nothing more than run and hide, as impossible as it was for him. Trapped in their cells, there was no way for Bucky to escape from Clint, not with only one arm.

Clint could.

At any time, Clint could tear himself away from Bucky, climb up the wall as limber as anything to that gap in the ceiling and go back to his own cell.

Despite that very fear, of being left so alone, when desire spiked through him, Bucky threw himself back from Clint abruptly. The guilt rose, leaving him gasping and yearning for Steve.

“James, James, please, what’d I do wrong?” Clint begged as he crawled after Bucky, then hesitated. His voice shook as he reached out, his fingers trembling as they grasped at Bucky’s ragged sleeve tentatively. Bucky stared up into Clint’s bewildered and scared eyes and choked, dropping forward against Clint, hiding his face in Clint’s neck and shuddering in his arms as Clint wrapped himself around Bucky as if Bucky hadn’t just pushed him away.

It wasn’t Clint’s fault that Bucky felt he was being unfaithful to Steve. Even though Steve was gone and never coming back. Even though Steve would be the one to tell him to find happiness where he could.

Bucky shuddered against Clint’s arms, back tense and tight.

“James,” Clint begged, his voice shaking. “You’re all I got left. What’s going on?”

Tears pricking at his eyes, Bucky shifted to look up into Clint’s face, into blue eyes that were as lost and scared as Bucky. Clint’s eyes were wide and he was biting his lip bloody though it healed over quickly. All at once, Bucky felt guilty again as he realized that Clint was scared of _him_. Scared to lose the only bright spot he had in this darkness. Bucky kept forgetting that Clint was younger than him, almost by a decade, and had suffered his own losses. It didn’t matter – brother or lover – they were both alone in hell now. Clint was right – they were all each other had left.

Bucky surged upward, best he could while still awkwardly off balance from only the one arm. He wrapped his other arm around Clint and buried his face once more in Clint’s neck.

“I’m sorry,” Bucky whispered. Clint clung to him, fingers desperate and clutching and Bucky –

Fuck, they were already in hell. How could anything get worse than this? Why should he deny himself, or Clint, anything that might make it more bearable? He pulled back, nosing up along Clint’s unshaven cheek and then, tentatively – fuck, what if he was wrong and it was just him that felt this desire coiling inside him? Clint could still run, could still abandon Bucky to his cell – brushed his lips against Clint’s.

Clint froze and Bucky stopped breathing, and then he was knocked back, Clint crawling on top of him. Bucky started breathing again, letting out a sigh of relief, and then his breath was stolen before he could draw another when Clint’s mouth crashed into his, as desperate as his fingers had been moments earlier.

Those same fingers now cradled Bucky’s face as Clint’s tongue delved into his mouth eagerly. Bucky groaned, eyes fluttered shut, shutting out the dirt, blood and grime lining Clint’s face, the dark dankness of the cell they weren’t _supposed_ to be sharing, and imagined instead a better setting, losing himself in the feel of Clint’s body covering his. The warmth of it. How it rubbed against Bucky in shuddering little pushes. Bucky’s hand groped up from the cold stone floor and fell on Clint’s side, rucking up the shirt to grasp at warm skin.

Clint gasped and jerked along the length of Bucky’s body at his touch and Bucky groaned when a hardness met his. Warmth, desire and desperation flooded through him, a need to just _feel good_ urging him forward, onward, his hand pushing downwards, slipping into the band of Clint’s pants and grasping the softness of a nicely rounded buttock, gripping and pulling, urging him to rock against Bucky again.

Bucky shuddered with each hard roll of Clint’s hips, grinding them together. Clint panted into Bucky’s neck, whining and cursing, the fingers still cradling Bucky’s face now shifting so Clint could suck at his neck, under his jaw and –

Choking on a curse, Bucky arched up, his fingers tightening on Clint’s ass. Clint thrust down, rubbing them together, harsh and electric and then spasmed on top of Bucky. Whining, Bucky pulled Clint back down into him, eyes rolling as he felt Clint’s come soaking through his clothes and knowing he’d done that, he’d brought Clint that pleasure in this place of pain and darkness -

He came with a sob, the two of them lying there, shaking in each other’s arms. Another sob broke through Bucky and Clint pushed himself up to look down at Bucky in alarm. Bucky turned his face away, but couldn’t stop the feelings of guilt and betrayal that swept through him.

“James? James, I’m sorry,” Clint babbled, scrabbling upwards and away. “I won’t do it again. I – “

Bucky’s hand still rested on Clint’s ass. He couldn’t get any words out, couldn’t tell Clint that he’d done nothing wrong, that Bucky had wanted it just as badly, that it was the first time he’d felt _good_ since, he didn’t even know when, anymore – so he flexed his fingers, shook his head and _pulled_ at Clint until Clint got the message and laid back down. Clint shifted them, got them more comfortable on their sides, wrapping himself around Bucky.

It was stupid. He was the elder, he should be comforting Clint and yet it was the other way around. It was weird, backwards; he was always the caretaker, the comforter, the one who fixed the problems. He couldn’t remember the last time someone took care of _him._

Steve had, when and where he could. But it had never been like this.

Bucky buried his face into Clint’s shoulder and just cried while Clint murmured words Bucky didn’t hear, and combed his fingers through Bucky’s hair.

He must have fallen asleep like that, cause when he woke, it was even darker, and he was cold and sticky and _alone_. Panic rushed through him and he shoved it down.

“Clint?” he whispered. Had Clint regretted what they’d done? Had Clint gone back to his own cell? Bucky rolled and shuffled towards the wall, to the hole in the wall and reached through it. “Clint?” Or had _they_ come while he slept? Fuck, no, if they’d taken Clint – how had he not woken?

Not like he could have stopped them, but he could have tried. Not that it would have made a difference. And it wasn’t like they wouldn’t bring Clint back… _eventually_ … but Bucky had quickly reached the point that any time they were separated, he was afraid it might be the last time they saw each other.

That day would come and he was sure it would destroy him.

And that was _before…_ this… whatever this had been. Losing his freedom, losing Steve, it was already so goddamn horrible, if he lost Clint too… it didn’t bear thinking on. Bucky swallowed, his voice scratching as he pushed a little more volume into his words. “Clint?”

There was a clang down the hallway outside of his cell, then footsteps and something being dragged and Bucky’s heart pounded. The steps stopped, a cell door creaked - not his, but light leaked through the hole Clint had made between their cells – and something was tossed inside, landing with a heavy thud.

_Clint._

Before Bucky could do much more than worry about Clint, the door slammed shut and the steps moved onward – only to stop in front of Bucky’s cell.

The door opened, a silhouette blocking off the light. “Your turn,” the familiar voice of a nameless guard growled. Bucky scrambled back and away, but couldn’t stop from being hauled up and dragged out of his cell.

* * *

They didn’t talk about it.

When Bucky returned from Zola’s torture, disconnected and fuzzy and hurting _– so much hurting_ – he couldn’t find the words, couldn’t remember the _need_ for the words, to discuss what he and Clint had done.

The guilt that Bucky felt.

Still felt.

But when Clint pulled him into his lap, Bucky didn’t fight him. God help him, but he craved it. The human contact, the gentle touch as he recovered, slowly, from all the shit Zola and his scientists put Bucky through.

It was only Clint that kept Bucky going through the experiments to his arm. If he’d thought the torture bad before, he’d been wrong, oh so wrong. The phantom pains had been hard to ignore, but nothing in comparison to everything else that they were doing to him, but now they were doing something to his shoulder, encasing it in hardware that invaded his body...

Bucky bit back the whimper as they dumped him back into his cell. He could feel things moving and shifting inside him and his shoulder was on fire.

Clint massaged his shoulder, held Bucky through the worst of the pain, as it slowly ebbed, becoming a low-level constant ache that pricked his brain and refused to let him settle, worse than even the phantom pains had been. But Clint had a solution for that too, pulling Bucky in to a kiss, as desperately as they’d kissed that first time, or falling to his knees and mouthing at Bucky through the worn pants. Bucky let him slip the rags down past his hips, let him pull Bucky into his mouth, Bucky eager and willing to find anything that could dull the pain, to feel human again.

To see the light that entered Clint’s eyes as he slid down Bucky’s dick and swallowed around him with a groan. Slowly, slowly, Bucky stopped feeling guilty every time they did so much as kiss, slowly he stopped comparing the blonde-haired blue-eyed kid to the one he’d given his heart to a long time ago.

The days they left Bucky and came for Clint left him pacing his cell, if he was in any condition to pace, an anxious mass of trepidation. The first time it took longer than a day for Clint to return, Bucky panicked, then hoped that maybe Clint had gotten out, had gone for help.

He didn’t dare think about the idea that maybe they’d finally found a way to kill Clint. It didn’t bear thinking of, not when bucky was stuck here, not knowing one way or the other.

If Clint _had_ gotten away, he could always mount a rescue, return for Bucky and any other prisoners that were still alive – hydra went through so many of them quickly – and trying to kill himself just to escape the pain and torture and loneliness would be wasteful.

But if Clint _was_ dead, what did Bucky have left?

No Steve, no Clint… half the man he was… was the war even over? He shook his head. No, the newspaper Clint had stolen, somehow, still lay in that hole hidden form the guards. It had said the war was over. And yet Zola was still alive and free. Hydra was still out there.

It wasn’t fair. Everything they’d sacrificed, and Hydra was _still_ out there.

Doors clanged and he spun around. There were footsteps. Multiple. But no dragging sounds.

Had they come for him, as they had several times while Clint was gone, or was Clint being returned to his cell at last? And where had he been? Bucky had looked, as best as he could while being dragged off to the rooms they always took him to in order to take him apart over and over again.

The creak of Clint’s door was loud, echoing through the cells and the hall. A rustle and a thump with a “Hey!” and the door slammed shut again and the footsteps retreated. Bucky deflated a little as they did, though he hurried over to the wall, dropping to speak through the hole.

“Clint!” Bucky couldn’t help the worry in his voice as he reached through the whole, groping with one hand until another grasped his.

“I’m here. don’t worry, I’m here,” Clint said. He was probably trying to sound reassuring but his voice cracked and broke and Bucky’s heart broke too. “I’d never leave ya.” The last words were a whisper that pulled on bucky painfully. What – was he saying he wouldn’t even try to escape as long as bucky was being held here? But that was stupid, because if Clint could escape, he could always get help.

“Jesus, doll, can you – “

Clint let go instantly and Bucky could hear him scrambling, then the scrape of Clint as he climbed the wall, dropping silently on the other side in front of Bucky. Bucky pushed to his feet to meet him but Clint was there, in Bucky’s space in the blink of an eye, shoving him against the wall. He molded his body into Bucky’s and ducked his head into his neck, onto his shoulder. Clint’s fingers clutched spasmodically at Bucky’s sides and he shuddered.

“Jesus,” Bucky whispered, his arm wrapping around Clint’s lower back. “What happened?”

As afraid to ask as he was… but it didn’t matter. Instead of answering, Clint shook his head. Wetness seeped through the thin shirt as Clint cried quietly, leaving Bucky to rub circles into the small of Clint’s back until he melted into Bucky, the posture turning natural, fluid, the rigid tension changing to something else.

Clint’s lips moved up Bucky’s neck till his mouth met Bucky’s ear and he sucked at the lobe and Bucky let out a little gasp and then Clint abruptly pulled away, pulling at his clothes.

Bucky stared at him with wide eyes as Clint took every last stitch of clothing off. “Clint?” he asked uncertainly, voice wavering more than he’d like.

“God, James, please. Let me feel something good,” Clint said, his hands reaching for Bucky’s shirt, his voice choked. Then he leaned in to whisper brokenly into Bucky’s ear and bucky choked. “I want you to fuck me.”

Bucky’s brain whited out. they hadn’t yet. And it… it had been enough. It hadn’t felt like the right time to try for more. Not here, in this place, where they were stealing moments to themselves already and then he realized that Clint was right.

This was one more thing they could steal for themselves. One more thing they could do to feel good and to stick it to their captors. Not that they wanted their captors to find out what they were doing, to use it against them. but as Clint pulled Bucky’s shirt over his head, as Clint slid Bucky’s pants down past his ass, then let them drop into a puddle at his feet, bucky didn’t fight it as maybe he should.

He was being selfish. He should stop this, stop Clint from exposing himself, exposing _them_ , to be used as a weakness to exploit.

But he needed this as much as Clint did.

He went where Clint pushed him, till he was sat on the rough blanket he’d been left, back against the wall, feet braced on the floor as Clint slid over Bucky’s legs, settled into his lap, pulling him into a deep kiss.

“How –“ Bucky managed to gasp between kisses and he didn’t need to say anymore than that because Clint was already pushing something into his hand and leaning up to press against himself higher onto Bucky. It was a jar, cap already off and when Bucky set it down and dipped his fingers inside, he found it was some sort of oil. “How?” he repeated incredulously.

“Got light fingers,” Clint said breathlessly. “Please, James.”

Bucky’s heart skipped at Clint’s pleading and his cock twitched against Clint’s. Swallowing, he slathered his fingers, nearly tipping over the jar before Clint saved it.

“Let’s not waste that,” he said, nuzzling into Bucky’s neck. “Don’t know when I’ll get my hands on more.”

Nodding, Bucky groped behind Clint, feeling his way down Clint’s crack, slipping a finger between the cheeks till he touched Clint’s hole. Clint twitched, a full body jerk that made bucky groan as it dragged Clint’s body along Bucky’s cock. With a held breath, bucky slowly circled Clint’s hole before pressing the tip of his finger inside, groaning as Clint whimpered and rocked slightly under his hand.

“C’mon, more, I can take more, James please,” Clint begged.

“Shhh…” Bucky said, even as he pressed his finger further inside. For the second time that hour, Clint melted into Bucky and then his lips moved, covering Bucky in wet, sucking kisses till he reached Bucky’s mouth and _claimed_ him.

And… and that was something. It had always been Bucky laying claim to Stevie, filled with jealousy over anyone who gave Steve a second look. He’d had to fight that back with Peggy, knowing that she hadn’t stolen Steve from him at all, had been willing to share. It’d been difficult, but it’d been do able.

But now Clint was clutching at him with a bruising intensity, and his kisses alternated between gentle and on the right side of too harsh. Bucky would have thought he’d hate that, but the possessiveness of it made him groan into Clint’s mouth. He thrust his finger into Clint, feeling the hot clench around his finger and sped up, as desperate, suddenly, to be inside Clint as Clint was to have bucky there.

They rocked together as Bucky added a second finger, as Clint whispered to him between kisses. “Can’t wait to feel you inside me,” Clint said, making Bucky’s eyes roll back in his head. “’s gonna be so good. “C’mon, I’m ready –“

Bucky didn’t think he was, but he was just as needy as Clint, like he’d never done anything like this before and wouldn’t last a second longer, and Clint would know best what he needed, right?

Pulling his fingers out of Clint, he fumbled for the jar of mystery fluid once more, managing to reach between them and coat himself in it. he’d barely finished before Clint was grasping at his cock and sinking down on it slowly, back bowed as panted, their hands leaned together.

It was slow. Agonizingly, breathtakingly slow, as Bucky let Clint control the slide, but he couldn’t keep his eyes open at the sensation of Clint’s tight ass squeezing his cock every bit of the way down. When Clint finally rested fully in Bucky’s lap, when Bucky’s cock was at last seated fully inside of Clint, the two of them sat frozen, their breathing echoing loudly through the room.

Bucky stared into those blue eyes with a little bit of wonder. How could Clint make him feel so good in this place? He reached up to cup Clint’s cheek, felt the brush of stubble against his palm. Clint’s eyes fluttered shut against Bucky’s gaze, as if it were too much, but he turned to nuzzle into Bucky’s hand.

Then he shifted and bucky keened as Clint set up a hard, fast pace, rising and dropping on Bucky’s cock. It was too much. It was all too much, and Bucky’s hand slid up into Clint’s shaggy hair, pulling him down into a rough kiss. Clint had all the leverage here, Bucky’s hips straining to push up, to plunge deeper, harder –

Clint cried out, Bucky swallowing the cry, hoping to god the guards didn’t hear, didn’t come barging in, didn’t come to find them here, like this and tear them apart –

Bucky’s grip on Clint’s hair tightened as Clint’s hips stuttered, as Clint squeezed around bucky, as Clint _came_ , splattering Bucky -

“C’mon,” Clint pulled back a little, thrusting down over Bucky’s still hard cock. “C’mon, want you to feel good too, feel alive. We deserve it, we deserve every god damn bit of it.”

Breathing hard, Bucky’s head went back and hit the wall, his hand slid down out of Clint’s hair, down to his hip and he pulled frantically at him, Clint murmuring encouragement, hands tangling in Bucky’s hair.

Biting his lip to keep the noise down, Bucky came, back arching away from the wall. “That’s it, James, that’s it….” Clint murmured against his lips, still rocking against him. “I’ve got ya, and you’ve got me, yeah?”

Still grasping at Clint’s hip, chest heaving, Bucky opened his eyes, to stare up into Clint’s. There was something unreadable there. “Yeah,” Bucky agreed hoarsely.

“Not gonna leave each other in this hell hole, right?” Clint’s voice was choked and small. “Either we get out together or we don’t?” His eyes were shining and wet again, begging, pleading.

_Oh._

Clint had nothing out there either.

“I won’t betray you like your brother did,” Bucky whispered to Clint and Clint fell into bucky with a sob he smothered into Bucky’s neck. Bucky rubbed at Clint’s back again. God, he wished they could get out of here.

Wished HYDRA had fucking _burned._

* * *

They took Bucky the next morning, long after he and Clint had cleaned themselves up and dressed themselves again. He didn’t see Clint again for weeks. Or longer. He wanted to push, to escape, to reassure Clint somehow that he was still alive, still there.

At least, that’s what he wanted to do in the rare moments of lucidity left to him.

They either had him on the table, working on the goddamn shoulder, adding a monstrosity of wire and metal to be his arm, or they had him in the chair, hooked up to the same device they’d seen Clint’s brother in on that first, disastrous escape attempt. It sent arcs of electricity through his body, making him scream himself hoarse.

It was becoming harder and harder to push out of the daze it put him in.

Sometimes he’d forget who he even was, but blonde hair and blue eyes and a promise kept rattling through his head. But the faces and the promises kept changing, morphing and twisting. And the words spoken to him now were harsher, overriding.

He’d shake his head and push against the static in his head, tried to focus, but his body was moving in ways he didn’t remember telling it too.

“I think he’s ready,” Zola said.

_Who’s ready_?

“Let’s take him out for a trial run,” Zola said again. “Come. I have your first task.”

Blankly, he followed Zola, and guards followed him, through doors and halls to a cell, Zola instructing him the whole way. Then they stopped before a door, wooden with bars, the wood scarred, the bars metal and black. Something was handed to him. “You know what to do.”

_What do I know?_

He frowned as the door opened and one of the guards pulled him along a hallway to stop before yet another door. They opened it and pushed him in, and he stumbled only slightly as they did.

The door slammed shut behind him.

There was a gasp. He wasn’t alone. That didn’t seem right – but then it did, his thoughts a jumbled mess, memories trying to push past the static. He reached for it with furrowed brow but it slipped away again.

“James!”

_Who was James?_ He shook his head. No, that was… that was familiar.

A man, blonde haired and blue eyed and fuzzily familiar, stepped close to him, eyes running up and down before hands reached out to trace the same pathways, making sure of – making sure of what?

“I was worried,” the man murmured, before pressing their lips together. That… that was familiar too. And it felt good. He let the other man kiss him, let himself enjoy it, almost forgot the task he’d been set till his hands moved without thinking, till he reached for the other man’s neck –

The collar snapped into place and the other man jerked back like he’d been shot. A soft hum filled the room as the other man stared at him with wide, confused eyes. “What did you do?” he whispered, his hand coming up to tug at the collar.

The door behind them opened at that moment and the other man jerked back further, putting distance between them all. He regretted that. Something in him wanted to pull the blonde closer, to protect him –

“Tsk tsk tsk, Mr. Barton. I wouldn’t do that if I were you. It could have… disastrous results,” Zola said as he entered with the guards from before. His voice was filled with gloating and Barton was instantly on guard.

Zola stepped up beside him, staring at Barton. He was taller than Zola, but Barton towered over them both. Zola looked up at him and the expression on his face made his stomach lurch sickeningly.

Was there something wrong with him?

“Well done, Sergeant Barnes.”

“James?” Barton whispered in horror. That was the second time Barton had called him James. Was that his name? Yes, yes, he thought it was. Barton searched his eyes, but James stood impassively, waiting. “What did you do to him?” Barton demanded, voice cracking

“What we’ve never been able to do to you or your brother – we’ve taken his mind.” Zola was still beaming. “The chair works. Without the serum, it kills, with your constitution, it’s pure torture. But Barnes here,” Zola reached out and patted James’s arm. “is truly glorious. He’s something in between, and it does what it was always meant to do.”

Zola snapped and a guard came forward, handing Zola a small device.

“You are his, and now he is ours,” Zola said. “He will be the perfect weapon. Deadly and obedient. And if you want to keep him, so will you. As added incentive, the collar can deal… immense pain.”

James felt something click around his neck but he didn’t even twitch. Then Zola pressed a button and the world went white hot with pain.

When he came to, he was on his hands and knees, gasping, throat raw, a pair of arms around him, his head pressed into a chest, a chest that rumbled as it spoke.

“Okay, okay, stop! I’ll do whatever you want, stop hurting him!”

“Of course you will,” Zola sneered. “In the end, HYDRA will _always_ win. Now come, my assets. We have a lot of work to do.”


End file.
